Many people enjoy booth style seating. Compared to a table with individual movable or attached stools or chairs, booth style seating can provide comfort and create intimacy in a public setting, with its typical wide, contoured or cushioned seats, high seat backs, and frequently a privacy panel extending above the top of the seat backs. Thus, booth seating is commonly included in the customer dining/lounge areas of restaurants, bars, coffee shops, and the like. However, booth style seating has been traditionally less common in school cafeterias and other institutional settings, where demands of mobility, efficient storage, and ease of cleaning often outweigh concerns regarding comfort and intimacy. Due to high seat backs, privacy panels, and the prevalence of unused bench surface between occupants which would otherwise be empty space between individual chairs or stools, booth seating is typically more bulky and heavier than individual seating, making it more difficult to move and store. Moreover, in addition to immobility, the typical positioning of booth seating next to a wall compounds the difficulty of cleaning on, around, and under booths.
A need therefore exists for a booth style bench that can provide comfort and privacy without sacrificing mobility, space-efficient storage, and ease of cleaning.